Not gonna lie, I had low expectations for
Bedlam at the Baxter Building (especially since it shares a title with one of my favorite stories in the run), since regular-ol' gangsters haven't been a credible threat to the team since its inception, and also because this is the penultimate Jack Kirby issue but this was actually a pretty solid issue. Nothing groundbreaking, but compared to a lot of stuff in the last couple of years worth of the book; perfectly solid.
A good C+/B- effort.
Independent of the issues with the story telling, the comic DID have a lot of coloring errors; but that might have just been the scans on Marvel Unlimited.
ANYHOO; an impromptu Fantastic Four Dance Party (one of the better ways to have a cold open) is interrupted by the world famous Baxter Buildings doorman, who is partly worried that the building is in danger of collapsing because the building is not cleared for Ben dancing and he was worried it might collapse, and mostly because he has to serve the FF an eviction notice; seems the world famous Baxter Building has been bought and paid for, and the new owners are the equally world famous
Maggia!
The Maggia hasn't come up in FF before, but they've made themselves well known in other Marvel books, particularly Spider-Man and Daredevil; they're one of the most expansive and powerful (and relatively non-super powered) crime syndicates in the world. Which you probably guessed by the fact that they almost share their name with another famous criminal organization.
Look, sometimes Stan kind of goes for the obvious name; can't all be Otto Octavious.
Side bar, but I've never been sure if that's supposed to be a hard or soft g in the name; I never pronounce it the same way twice.
And just in case anyone reading didn't put together any possible overlap between the Maggia and organized crime; we're treated to a cartoonishly stereotypical mob scene where a maggia lieutenant known simply as The Top Man (no relation to Robot Master DW No.21.) explains his plan; Legally Buy the Baxter Building using the maggias enormous financial resources... then kick the FF out and legally own all their stuff.
A plan which works far better than it reasonably ever could.
Anyway, the newly homeless FF are... kind of bummed out that known criminals legally own their building, and kicked them out, but left all their stuff inside. Reed suggests letting lawyers handle it since, while I don't know much about home law, I'm pretty sure that there's lots of reasons this plan of theirs wouldn't work.
Johnny, on the other hand... is Johnny Storm, so he decides to Flame on and just... well... be Johnny Storm at the problem; see how that affects things.
And if you think there's an upper limit to how grossly overconfident Johnny Storm can become, this will quickly disabuse you of that notion, because Johnny is almost immediately knocked unconscious and tied up by the Maggia goons.
And as much blanket disdain I have for Johnny Storm in general; he's been a superhero for longer than nearly anyone else in the Marvel Universe; especially by this point in the comic continuity. He routinely handles alien invaders, advanced robots and some of the worlds greatest tactical and scientific minds; this was a handful of guys in dumb masks and jump-suits.
So Reed, Ben and Crystal see Johnny immediately get knocked out from across the city (it was a graceful stunning aerial failure) and decide he needs rescuing; and best to do it before Sue can get back from dropping Franklin off at Agatha Harknesses and she can learn what a stressful day everyone is having.
For the record, Crystal is much more genre savvy than everyone else in the book by out-right mentioning that a bunch of mob guys with dumb masks really shouldn't pose any kind of threat whatsoever; they're the friggin' Fantastic Four. Unfortunately, she points this out less than halfway through the issue, and that means that a handful of mob hitmen in goofy masks are more than a match for the worlds greatest superhero team; and the lot of them are immediately given a snoot full of the ol' sleeping gas.
Then, because mobsters gonna mobster, they decide to press this advantage by putting all of them in cement coffins, cahining them shut and chucking them into the river. Which is some real mission creep, since The Top Man just wanted to kick them out of their home legally.
Anyway, the dramatic escalation in threat doesn't really amount to much, since this assortment of random gangsters didn't collect Marvel Trading cards, and so they don't realize that Crystal isn't just a gal with a legitimately impressive dye-job; she's the princess of a super-powered nation and one of the most powerful Earth-born heroes to exist, and also she can control all elements of nature.
So yeah... being tossed into a lake is really not a problem for her, and she effortlessly breaks herself and the rest of the team free and, after confirmed that Johnny did
not drown to death when knocked unconscious and sealed in a cement coffin, the team rallies and heads back to the Baxter Building since they're pretty sure that attempted murder is more serious than trespassing, so they can enter their house again.
And they needn't have bothered, as Sue (who was conspicously absent from the story so far) has returned to the Baxter Building, and found her family missing, and a whole bunch of Maggia goons milling about, and quickly determines that some comic book shenanigans are afoot. And furthermore; she has a whole bunch of really good super-powers and is up against a handful of murderous gangsters who have just attacked her family.
And so we're treated to one of the rare instances in the whole Lee/Kirby run of Sue just absolutely
wrecking house. No zany antics, no waiting and being told specifically what to do by the men in her life, no simpering in the corner watching other people fight.
No no... just a solid four pages of a gal with telekinetic shields, invisibility, a complete disregard for the well-being of others, and 100 issues worth of being side-lined to work through.
And work through she does; single-handedly taking out the entire hit squad without breaking a sweat; kicking at least one guy directly in his entire face, and coming about as close as the CCA would allow to shooting a man by setting up forcefields to cause one mobsters bullets to ricochet back at him.
Kind of feel like Jack was feeling obligated to let the women he created for the book have at least one moment of unmitigated triumph before he left the book.
Anyway, the rest of the FF show up just as the last goon is dispatched; when that doorman from earlier shows up again and guns down one of the Maggia guys in cold blood. And THIS Reed considers to be a bit suspicious, so he grabs the doorman and takes off his hat; revealing the Doorman to be The Maggia Top Man after-all, killing off his hench-men so they wouldn't blab to the feds!
How Reed knew this I have no friggin' idea because he didn't interact with either the doorman and he didn't know that The Top Man existed; he just... has to take peoples hats off, I guess.
Anyway, the Top Man is hauled off the jail, and his entirely legal purchase of the Baxter Building is revoked (I... guess?) and Reed and Sue wonder aloud how they can bear to raise a child in a world so steeped in evil that it has gangsters in it.
NEXT TIME: Hail to the King